On April 29th,2009 I delivered a seemingly healthy baby boy.We chose to name him Zebadiah(which means gift from God).Little did we know somewhere deep inside this tiny body was a person who was literally going to shake the Earth from beneath our feet.
During the phase of infancy we did not notice anything out of the ordinary. It was not until his toddler years that Zebadiah clearly had a language delay.It just seemed like he could not say no more than dada,bye bye,cup and ball,no mater the efforts we had made.
Zebadiah's was referred to an early intervention program.It was all new and a bit overwhelming for him and us.Speech therapy was first.....then they said he needed Occupational therapy??We thought that was only for adults!!
I began doing research on answers.What was going on with my child?Was he this...was he that?What should we expect?So many questions and it all caved in on me fast.Sending me down a dangerous spiral of depression and panic attacks.
Through therapy and unconditional love for my son and the drive of a private investigator...I still searched for answers.ESPECIALLY answers other than Autism.No matter how much I didn't want it to be so....deep down i knew it was.I was in great DENIAL!
Next I searched for someone who could give him some sort of diagnoses or say "hey you were wrong...its this instead....".STILL it was Autism!But at that point in time....I stopped thinking about how "bad"this was and started seeing progress in our son.his vocabulary had grown farther than i expected.He just couldn't say it,but it was there.A SPARK!!! a spark for LEARNING!!From that day forward I have pushed him to do his best at everything and i don't see Autism as bad but a blessed awakening of my soul!!He is still truly God's gift!
Grand Ridge, FL